In the United States, firearms capable of fully automatic fire may only be legally taken into possession by qualified, law-abiding individuals or organizations that apply for and obtain the requisite permission from the local authorities and the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco Firearms and Explosives (BATFE). In the United States, the process that must be followed to legally obtain a fully automatic machine gun can take over 12 months to complete. Forms must be filled, mailed, received, reviewed, and filed, and fingerprints must be taken and background checks performed by law enforcement officers and the BATFE. Processes can vary from state to state, county to county and city to city, making it very difficult for machine gun dealers to efficiently handle machine gun supplies to meet machine gun demands, particularly because the dealer takes possession of the purchased firearm during the waiting period and must properly store it, also in accordance with a great number of laws and regulations. The process is likely similar in other countries that permit the purchase of such weapons.
There are many individuals and organizations that purchase machine guns and yet do not actually need a functioning machine gun for the purpose for which it was purchased. For example, dealers in machine gun mounts need only an imitation of a machine gun having those features necessary to mount the imitation in an intended mount in order to show that the mount would be functional for the corresponding functional machine gun the imitation is to simulate. Yet, because it is desirable to show potential customers a very accurate representation of the interaction between the machine gun and the mount, mount dealers often purchase functioning machine guns, despite the significant paperwork and waiting periods associated with the processing of the paperwork. When a functioning machine gun is used, the mount dealer must also follow all laws and regulations respecting the storage, transport and exhibition of machine guns. However, it is only necessary to use a functioning machine gun as part of a mount display if the entity to which the mount is being shown desires to view how the mount functions during the firing of the machine gun or otherwise wishes to see an actual functioning machine gun in the mount. Otherwise, a non-firing imitation could be used, though it would have to have the features necessary for proper mounting to the intended mount. Thus, there is a need in the art for a means for providing a non-firing imitation gun that imitates a functioning machine gun.
Other entities, for purposes of teaching and training, may desire non-firing imitation guns that, though they are non-firing, simulate one or more of the steps of cocking, firing and cycling of the functioning machine gun that they are intended to imitate. For instance, for military classroom purposes, it might be desired to have in the classroom a non-firing imitation gun that externally looks substantially identical to the functioning machine gun that it imitates, but yet does not provide all of the firing components necessary to permit the non-firing imitation gun to cycle as intended to fire rounds. Thus there is a need in the art for a non-firing imitation gun that still permits some amount of replication of the cycling of the machine gun it is intended to imitate.
The receiver portion of the machine gun typically houses the components that cause the machine gun to be characterized as a machine gun and thus be subject to the aforementioned laws and regulations. Although receivers often differ from one model of machine gun to the next, the art would benefit from concepts for manufacturing a non-firing housing, wherein the manufacturing concepts can be applied to a multitude of different types of receivers associated with different types of machine guns. Because a non-firing housing is not subject to the same laws and regulations respecting functioning receivers, any entity that desires a non-firing imitation gun that imitates a functioning machine gun could benefit from the provision of such non-firing housings.
Notably, merely altering a receiver so that it does not function as a functioning receiver is not necessarily sufficient to avoid the application of laws and regulations respecting the ownership, storage, transport and exhibition of machine guns. Particularly, in the United States, if a receiver has been modified such that it fails to function as a machine gun receiver, it would still be subject to laws and regulations regarding machine guns. According to the BATFE, once a machine gun has been manufactured and registered, it will always be considered a machine gun, no matter its state of non-functionality. The only exception is if a destruction notice is filed and evidence has been submitted to establish the complete destruction of the machine gun. Additionally, even if a receiver is initially manufactured to prohibit functioning as a machine gun, it will still be subject to all laws and regulations respecting machine guns if it is capable of being readily converted back to a functioning machine gun receiver. Thus, though there is a need in the art for non-firing housings that imitate functioning receivers of machine guns, the art would further benefit from such non-firing housings being manufactured such that the conversion of the non-firing housing into a functioning receiver is significantly frustrated.